


The Path Between Us

by Letterhead



Series: Path of Fate [1]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bullying, Complete, F/M, Fix-It of Sorts, Fluff and Angst, Implied/Referenced Torture, Minor Character Death, Time Skips, Time Travel, Time Travel Fix-It, True Love, almost canon compliant, of sorts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-10
Packaged: 2019-11-12 07:53:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 14,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18006863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Letterhead/pseuds/Letterhead
Summary: Hermione finds a peculiar incantation scrawled on the bottom of a desk. When spoken, it pulls forth your true love for a kiss. Will it work?





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I own nothing, as per usual. 
> 
> To any of my regular readers, fear not, this is not my coy way of saying I've abandoned my other works for this. I am still tirelessly working on them when I can after work.

It was just a simple little thing, barely a spell really. Scrawled as it was on the underside of a desk in the transfiguration classroom. Eleven-year-old Hermione Granger would have never seen it had she not dropped her quill on her way out of class that morning. It sounded silly, the wording childish even to her, and yet the swot in her demanded it be known, memorized, utilized.

A small finger traced the lettering in the wood grain. She was alone in the classroom, everyone had moved on without her. She could... she could just...

"True love, true love, do you truly miss me? True love, true love, won't you come and kiss me."

A moment passed. It was all so utterly silly and Hermione's cheeks flamed pink at her near stupidity for believing it might do something. She crawled from under the desk, quill in hand, only to drop it once more to the cold flagstone floor. Standing in a pool of light, just there, was a boy. He looked on with a similarly disbelieving expression, thin lips hanging open.

Stunned, Hermione walked towards the boy wreathed in light, a smile blooming on her face. Was this boy her true love? It felt all too strange, but she'd always hoped... always dreamed...

And now a kiss? Her eyes darted away from the boy with a shyness she'd never felt before. It was too much. She felt a soft, barely-there touch on her cheek. Looking up, she found the ghostly boy’s finger gently poking at her. Hermione laughed then, and before the boy could react or she could talk herself out of it, she leaned into the portal and kissed him chastely on the lips. A few seconds lip locked felt like a lifetime for the first year girl, and when she finally pulled back she could see defined splotches of color across the boy’s face. There was no time, Hermione found, after that moment to study him, for he vanished. Hermione let out a pained sound as the image spun out of existence.

Later, Hermione Granger could be found walking the halls with a secretive smile on her face, her fingers pressed against her lips. It was only in bed that evening that Hermione bemoaned her lack of thought to check his uniform, if he had one, to see if he were also a Hogwarts student.

 

-

 

Severus was red-faced, angry, and ashamed. He'd thought Hogwarts would be the end of his torment, the home he'd always wanted but it wasn't. It couldn't be. Not even with Lily just a few floors away. He was standing in the corridor, silently willing tears not to fall as the Gryffindor boys laughed. His books had been pushed out of his grasp, scattered around on the dusty floor.

"Pick them up, yob!" the older one jeered. The word didn't cut deep, Severus knew he was poor, but it cut all the same.

"Yeah Snape, pick up your books!" another laughed. "Or we could throw them away!" The group began laughing anew at the idea, and Severus began to panic. These were his only books, given to him in the night by his terrified mother. This was all he cared about!

"No!" he shouted, scurrying to pick them up. Damn them, but he would rather make himself look foolish than have them take the books. Potter, who joined the group last, grabbed a book from the pile and began guffawing at the title.

"Magical Love Anecdotes? Planning on bewitching the girls in school? That's the only way a girl would ever fancy you, Snivellus!"

Severus' face went ashen as he snatched the book from Potter. "Shut it, you bastard!" The group found his new moniker the peak of wit, and they took delight in jeering it as he finished collecting his books and ran off.

In a secluded alcove, he finally allowed himself to breathe. Not to cry, however, because he never did. Never once would he let himself cry, and not because of some arse like Potter spouting some nonsense. Severus turned the slim, rust-colored volume in his hands and gasped. How peculiar, it was actually a book about Magical Love. Why his mam, married to a muggle, would have this he didn't know. But... his heart clenched as he thought of Lily. Maybe it could help him. Severus was sure he was in love with her, or he thought he might be at least. He quickly scanned the pages, love philters, chastity enchantments, strange stories of consummation. It all made him feel a bit nauseous, actually, until the last page. It was written in pen in the margin next to a recipe for tea that promised the imbiber would be willing for... adult activities. He shuddered but focused on the scrawl in the border. An odd sounding poem of sorts.

"True love, true love, do you truly miss me? True love, true love, won't you come and kiss me."

Before he knew it, Severus was laughing silently to himself. What was this rubbish? Some playground song or something. Looking up from the book he felt the air rush out of his lungs as, standing so close he could see the lion crest of her Gryffindor jumper, a girl appeared before him. She looked a bit foggy, blue and wispy like a ghost, but she was ensconced by a sort of portal. Gaping like a fish, his eyes quickly snapped to her face and he felt a pang of loss. It was decidedly not Lily Evans. Was she not... not his true love? He really had thought...

The girl moved towards him, her expression shy but curious. It did things to his stomach he didn't quite understand. She looked away from him, perhaps in disgust. Instantly Severus was self-conscious of his tatty clothes and his poorly sheared hair. Poor girl, he thought, to find your true love looking like such a git.

A part of Severus didn't believe it, didn't think it was real at all. He poked a finger out and gasped when it made hazy contact with her soft cheek. It startled her from whatever thought she'd been thinking.

She turned back and with a lovely smile breached the portal and sealed her lips to his. His ears felt instantly red hot, this girl was kissing him! Her lips were soft, not gross at all. Severus had thought to kiss any girl, other than Lily of course, would be horrid. But the girl kissing him right then wasn't anything close to horrid. Severus felt his eyes threaten to close, the feeling of being touched so strange and wonderful, but before they did the girl rocked back on her heels. She looked... looked rather pleased with herself, and Severus felt terribly flustered.

Then she was gone. The girl, his true love - if that could be believed - was gone. He found that he missed her and wished he could have known her name. And if maybe she liked Potions.

A few days later, Lily said she wouldn't make it to do her homework with him in the library as they had promised, and Severus found himself withstanding the brush-off rather well. Lily wasn't his true love, and though that fact still made him sad, somewhere out there a girl in a Gryffindor uniform was. And wasn't that just something. 


	2. Chapter 2

Lily had abandoned him again, for the girls that always hovered about Potter and Black. It stung, but Severus had come to expect that from his friend. Lily was adamant that she would never directly socialize with the boys who tormented him, but truth be told he didn't believe her. She was becoming too popular, too social to ignore them. But he trusted her word, for the most part. 

They'd spent a good summer together, recounting their experiences from school that previous year. Severus felt a sliver of guilt for not telling Lily everything that had happened to him, but his kiss with the girl in the portal was... was his. He didn't want anyone else to know. She was his secret. 

Severus had tried to ask his mam about the book, but she wouldn't say anything, too afraid Tobias would overhear. That lousy git had spilled lager on his school uniform just before he'd gone to Kings Cross. With no one to magically clean the cloth, Severus had gone to school smelling faintly of alcohol that September. He'd received looks from the parents on the platform, and he noted the way they had all whispered to their children about him. Potter's mother had looked at him so pityingly it made his face burn with shame. How dare that woman pity him, especially since her son was such a bastard! 

He sat in a train compartment alone that year. Lily had been off with her girlfriends. 

He'd tried the poem spell in the lonely compartment, but his girl hadn't come. Maybe... maybe it didn't work anymore. 

As the months of school passed Severus tried numerous times, day and night, but it always failed. He didn't know why.

He'd been in the library studying for Charms when he tried it again. Severus was ensconced in the back corner of the library, the one he'd found the Marauders never checked when trolling for targets.

Under his breath he muttered the rhyme, a habit really, but to his great surprise it worked. Sitting across from him at the table was the Gryffindor, smiling happily as she saw him. She said something he could not hear, her voice sounded like it was deep underwater. He shrugged, indicating he didn't catch it and looked away bashfully. They had both called each other for... for a kiss. Severus looked about the library quickly and found no one was around to witness what he hoped would happen. They made eye contact shyly, the girl smoothing down her nest of hair unsuccessfully. Slowly they met over the center of the table, awkwardly leaning over their homework to reach one another. Severus went for the kiss, but too quickly. His nose collided with hers, and he backed away as if burnt. What a prat he was!

He looked back to her just as she was leaving a spectral feeling peck on his nose, a light and lovely reminder that she was waiting. For him. 

With newfound confidence, Severus met her lips finally and kissed. It was longer than the last time, and her lips felt just... just lovely. When they parted he felt lighter than air, and he desperately wished he could kiss her again. Her small wave of goodbye was met with his own, more hesitant one. He didn't want her to leave. Her smile dipped into a frown as she looked down at his tie, no doubt judging him for his house affiliation. She disappeared before he could try and do anything about it.

He never managed to call her back to his side that year. Severus desperately hoped it wasn't because she no longer wished to be found.

 

-

 

Hermione was in a tizzy. Her love was a... a Slytherin! Her lips were still tingling from the kiss they'd shared in her corner of the library. It felt so wrong, to kiss a Slytherin while this Chamber of Secrets fiasco was happening. But he was... he was her true love, was he not? Hermione reasoned over breakfast the next morning that he must not be all that bad then, for she would never love some truly horrible person. 

Her research into the spell had turned up nothing, and Hermione was not about to inquire after it from one of her professors. They'd think her mad! Instead, Hermione spent the rest of her year researching the Chamber, before she'd gone and gotten herself petrified. 

Hermione never had a chance to try the spell again that year, and she didn't dare do a spell outside of school even though she so desperately wanted to.


	3. Chapter 3

All Lavender and Parvati talked about were boys. Boys, and kisses, and it was making Hermione sick. Here she was, literally warping time so she could study harder, and they were prattling about flirting techniques. Hermione had used her time wisely that first semester, only turning it for classes and nothing more. 

But she was becoming so weary, and so horribly lonely. 

Perhaps the reason her roommates' chin wagging and giggling bothered her so badly was that she wished she had time for boys, or someone to talk to about _her_ boy. Hermione had begun to think of him possessively like that, as he didn't quite exist outside their encounters. She often wondered what he was like, a Slytherin and yet a romantic. The image of that somehow didn't quite fit in her mind. Other than guessing at what he was like and what his name was Hermione _tried_ not to dwell on it, but she couldn't help it. He was a preoccupation. She might never meet him for real, and it utterly frightened her.

One late Sunday evening in November Hermione finally had enough of everything. School was becoming horrifyingly overwhelming, even for her, and the boys' anxiety over the events of that year were beginning to turn them into first class prats. Harry was obsessing over Malfoy and Buckbeak, Ron was being his typical thick, contrary self and she... well she was tired. Everything the boys were worried over always ended up in her lap to fix. Hermione needed _him_. And so she repeated the spell, late at night in the Owlery after posting a letter to her parents. 

He materialized in a blue cloud of light, and she had to look up to meet his eyes. He'd grown a head taller since she last saw him, and the look of him stole her breath away. There was a hard look about him that said he'd done some growing up mentally too. She didn't like it, not one bit. He was holding his books to his chest, and his left eye was bruised with splotches of red and purple. His nose was bleeding, too, a steady drip of red down to his lip. Concealed behind the curtain of his hair were more injuries, but he couldn't hide from her. The books he had been carrying fell to the floor, as apparently, he hadn't expected her.

"Oh no, come here!" Hermione dashed to him, throwing her arms around his neck. In that moment she didn't care that he was a Slytherin, or that he looked a bit severe, or that he was a bloody mess. She didn't care if they didn't really know one another. 

Hermione ghosted her fingers over his bruised eye, her lips so close to his jaw. Slowly, as if in disbelief, he took her into an embrace. 

"I wish I knew if you were okay, you look like you've been in a fight! Oh, I wish we could speak!" Hermione stamped her foot on the dirty floor of the Owlery, much to his amusement. He raised a brow in curiousness, in a strange way that had her stomach tying itself into knots. Oh, she really, really wanted to kiss him. 

"I'm going to kiss you now," Hermione said, mostly for her own benefit. She needed the courage. 

Hermione slid her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck and pulled him down, lips nearly touching. He was looking at her with an intensity that had her heart beating rather fiercely, she could feel his breath on her skin.

"I'm going to kiss you..." she repeated, lips then pressing featherlight onto his. He gripped her jumper tightly, leaning into her and deepening the kiss just enough to make her head spin. This was so far beyond what she was prepared for. Hermione could taste the coppery tang of blood on his upper lip and it terrified her. Who was this boy? They released each other's lips, faces both scarlet from exhilaration and fear. Hermione grasped the tails of his Slytherin scarf, begging the universe to let him stay. 

He didn't. He dissipated into the unknown, but the fringe she'd been gripping stayed behind. Hermione held them in her palm, teary-eyed. This was all she had of her enigmatic true love. Some green and silver yarn.

She kept them between the pages of her notebook for safekeeping, checking they were still there each day. 

 

- 

 

Lucius had gifted him a text on Mind Magic in his third year and he had become rather obsessed with studying it. It, Severus believed, could unlock the ability to open up others minds and keep his... shut. He hated the talent some people had to read his emotions on his face. They couldn't do that, however, if he felt nothing. Instead, he could peak into their minds and predict their actions, always staying a step ahead.

He was spending even less time with Lily. It was almost December and he'd only seen her properly twice. She hated 'what he was becoming', whatever that meant. She claimed he was acting dark, that _good_ wizards didn't need to read people's minds. 

He didn't want to be a good wizard. James bloody Potter was a 'good' wizard. All the professors claimed so, which irked Severus to no end. Severus wanted to be a powerful wizard, so he studied, and did his best to perfect the art of Occlumency while avoiding the 'pranks' of Potter and his ilk. 

He didn't manage to avoid them forever. 

Black and Potter had cornered him after dinner and had thoroughly hexed him. Severus retaliated with a fist to Black's pompous face, serving up pain the muggle way. Black screamed, then reared back for his own, sloppy strike. Severus was too cocky, for the strike made contact with his face and there was a distinct crack of bone. It landed him on his arse, yet he made no sound or expression of pain. 

"What are you, an Inferius? Yell! Cry!" Black yelled in his blank face, hitting him again for good measure. Potter then kicked him in the ribs.

"Cry, Snivellus! Come on, cry!"

He didn't. They eventually got tired of beating him senseless and left him there in a heap. Severus pulled himself together, relying solely on his cleared mind to cope with what had happened. He never wanted to feel anything again. 

He walked to the Owlery to find some solitude, in hopes that he could continue to maintain the detachment between his mind and his physical pain. The mental pain was bleeding through, however. It had been nearly a year since he last saw the Gryffindor girl. He'd tried the spell, but he was sure she would never appear again. She'd taken one look at his Slytherin tie and frowned, then evaporated out of his life with his heart in her hand. He said the spell like a hopeless mantra but thought nothing of it. A whisper of wind brushed his shoulders and chilled him, and suddenly the Owlery was filled with blue, iridescent light. 

There she was! His girl. Beyond the impossible, she still loved him!

Severus dropped his books, he really never thought he'd see her again. She was talking anxiously, and this time he didn't need to hear her to know what she was speaking about. She ran to Severus and nearly tackled him, touching his wounded face. She was concerned about him, about his wellbeing. Warmth spread from every place of contact, and he couldn't help but enclose her in his arms. This was all he had and all he wanted. She was petulantly displeased at whatever had injured him, and he couldn't help but smirk at her, raise his eyebrow in a way he desperately hoped looked suave. Now she was whispering. Severus could feel the breath of her words against his lips and it made him shiver. He never wanted to it to end, but it did. 

She'd taken a part of his scarf with her, the thief, and now the thing had a strange looking patch with no tassels. No doubt he would be mocked for looking extra tattered, but he couldn't bring himself to care. She had a part of him now, and Severus was sure he loved her. 


	4. Chapter 4

Hermione was horribly upset. The Sleekeazy in her hair was starting to fail, her makeup was smudging, and her night was ruined. 

She'd just wanted to feel beautiful. Going to the Yule Ball with Viktor had been a mistake. After a few fun dances, he had taken her aside and had kissed her, roughly, and it was all _wrong_. Hermione thought they were friends. She pushed Krum away and wiped her lips, horrified. He was angry, so angry that she had 'strung him along', that she had been a tease. Hermione hadn't meant to... she really didn't mean to be anything of the sort.  She wasn't even ready for that kind of relationship yet. Hermione went back to the ballroom in shame, hoping to get her bag and flee back to Gryffindor Tower. That's when Ron happened. He had to be an utter git at just the worst moments, always sticking his nose into things he didn't understand. 

That's how she'd ended sobbing in an abandoned classroom while everyone else danced and enjoyed themselves. She wanted to dance, but not with Krum. Hermione knew who she wanted. 

"True love... true love..." she spoke the poem slowly, shakily, pulling him forth from wherever he was. Before her he stood awkwardly, even taller than last year, clothed in a ratty shirt and just his pants. Hermione blushed deep scarlet, she never imagined she would catch him in his bed, nearly... nearly undressed. She was rambling, about her hair and her dress when he silenced her, swiftly holding her and burying his face in her neck. It felt so different this time, this time Hermione didn't just want to kiss him. She wanted more. 

He pressed his lips to hers soundly and with ease, like he'd been waiting for this. For her. One of his hands threaded through her hair and pulled it down from the sticking charm, and Hermione's lips parted with an exhale of pleasure. He deepened the kiss, exploring her mouth properly for the first time. Hermione was light headed and clinging to his tall frame shakily, his hands were on her bared shoulder blades and it was too much! She loved him, needed him. Hermione felt their bodies meet at the precipice of the portal and her eyes shot open. This was so real compared to when they’d met before. They broke just for air, but the portal had other ideas. It began to shrink and pull them apart, they _had_ kissed after all. His eyes were panicked and angry as he tried to keep them connected, but their hands had to part lest they get cut off by the shrinking blue tear in reality. It whirled into nothing, and Hermione fell to the floor with a wretched sob. 

This was beginning to feel like madness.

 

-

 

The book was worn, far more than it had been when he was a boy. His calloused fingers caressed the familiar, cracked leather spine, and that final page that both delivered him and haunted him. There in the margin was the surprisingly potent piece of magic contained within the childish rhyme. There were smudges over the words, traces of his adolescent fingers. It brought the barest hint of a smile to his lips, the memory of those kisses, shared between who knows what kind of time or space. Between himself, and that mysterious Gryffindor girl.   

The recollections, particularly of their first few encounters, were fond in Severus' memory. Later though, as the girl he barely knew grew into a woman, she became harried and frail. Her eyes were haunted with fear and strange loathing, for himself or her situation he never knew. Her kisses had become more maddening and physical then. After their last encounter he had wondered, more obsessed over really, what had happened to her. In deeply disturbing and low moments, usually after being deep in his cups or recently tortured, he would recite that blasted poem spell. 

But nothing would happen. She never appeared again, and eventually he stopped trying.

 

-

 

It was the evening of the Yule Ball, a blasted celebration of an unnecessary and tasteless trial the children were being forced to participate in. It all felt so... so malicious to put the students through what was essentially the modern day equivalent to the Colosseum. It didn't even give Severus pleasure to see Potter miserable and paranoid, just the principle alone was enough to make the entire thing abhorrent. 

Especially because it had made it necessary for him to attend this blasted ball. 

Weird Sisters were playing loudly, and though it could barely be described as music, the children were dancing happily to it. He didn't begrudge them their dancing, for soon their world would be lost in turmoil. His forearm ached with the proof of it. The Dark Lord would return. This may be the last happy memory many of these children would have for some time. 

Severus spotted Hermione Granger at the edge of the dance floor looking put out and near tears. It had been a surprise to see her on the arm of the Bulgarian champion earlier that evening, but it appeared she had lost him. Instead she was fighting with the youngest Weasley boy, as was becoming typical for the two that year. Mid eye-roll at their antics, Severus caught a glimmer from the girl's dress that felt vaguely nostalgic. The dress was a periwinkle sort of thing, shapeless yet tastefully feminine. If Granger turned just so in the light of the Great Hall lanterns the layers of the material would catch it and simply... shine. It made him think of, well, someone he didn't like to dwell on when he wasn't holed up in his rooms with a bottle of scotch. The Granger girl turned from her party of friends and ducked out of the Hall, going somewhere to cry no doubt. Severus followed her at a safe distance, his first instinct to corner her and take points. Students were not to be found in the halls during gatherings such as this. 

Down a hall, a turn, then another. He found the girl in an abandoned classroom sniffling to herself. From his vantage Severus could see the girl's smudged muggle makeup and mussed hair. The reminiscence came in a stronger wave this time, the dull ache in his withered heart turning into a pang. His Gryffindor girl had looked like that when... no, best not dwell on it.

Severus resolved to think on it no more and was about to step into the classroom to deduct points when he heard her soft voice. 

"True love..."

Severus stilled, his breath bated and unsure.

"True love..." 

"No..!" Severus hissed lowly. This wasn't... this couldn't be possible.

"Do you truly miss me?" Grangers delicate voice faltered, taking a breath to sniffle.

It was all too wrong!

"True love, true love, won't you come and kiss me?" Seconds later the silent blue light of that familiar portal filled his blurring vision, and there he was. Fourteen and lanky, startled out of his wits while in bed. Severus nearly cringed at his own hawkish features as his younger self approached the precipice of the portal. 

"I know I look rather bad..." Granger quietly self-deprecated, "But I missed you so terribly and I wanted... I wanted to..." Her words muffled as his younger self reached through the portal and wrapped the witch in his arms. With a clumsy hand, young Severus brushed away her unruly hair and kissed her. Severus recalled the taste of her lips well; the chaste kisses of their previous encounters had been replaced by curiosity and teenage hormones. He covered his eyes with a hand to shield himself, but it could not be helped. This memory had been so thoroughly recalled that he almost felt like it was playing in the darkness of his mind in full technicolor. 

The portal closed, nearly slicing off the young man’s fingers as he was loathe to part from her. With a wail of anguish, Hermione Granger threw herself to the floor. 

"I love him, please bring him back!" 

Severus hurried away from the scene silently, shaking from the roiling emotions building within him.

In his rooms, he released his Occlumency, feeling the full brunt of what he'd witnessed. The girl, his love, whom he'd always assumed was in another dimension or time, was here, and it was Hermione Granger. The reality of that was a blade deeply embedded in his blackened heart, cutting away the last vestige of love he'd kept there.  It was a betrayal of her memory, of the moments they'd shared. 

After a drink, he thanked Merlin and Nimue that he hadn't dared utter that damned spell in years. The shock of finding himself standing before... before a child... it was too much to even think of. He drank until he couldn't remember what he'd witnessed. Until he slept. 

Classes with her were torture. Seeing her, realizing she'd been right here for years. And who she was. Laughing with Potter, shooting her hand up at every moment in class, staring daggers when he took points from her friends. Every time Severus looked at Hermione Granger, he heard her tortured plea, that she loved him, and he hated her for it.

She would not feel so violently in love if she knew the boy she'd been kissing was he, a greasy, unlovable old man. No, she would more likely wish to throw herself off the Astronomy Tower. 

And now he had just a little less to live for. His memories of their rendezvous had been bottled and shelved, never to be recounted. 

He just couldn't bear it. 


	5. Chapter 5

It was fifth year when she finally told someone. 

"Harry? What if I told you... that I fancied someone?" It was just the two of them in the common room, Ron had nearly sleep-walked his way upstairs earlier. Harry sat up from his reclined position on the couch, his curiosity piqued. Hermione sounded terrified and shy, which was so unlike her.

"Well that's great news, right? Ron will be thrilled." 

Hermione bit her lip, wincing. "No, it's not Ron." 

"Well, someone should tell Ron then. He's utterly convinced that you are." Harry scratched his chin thoughtfully. "And to be fair you did look rather jealous when Lav was flirting with him." 

"I was never jealous, Harry, I just don't like public displays of affection. Truly, it's not Ron," Hermione said, exasperated. 

"Well then, who is it?"

Hermione shrunk back and a look of dismay swept over Harry’s face.

"Is it... is it a girl?" Harry inquired quietly. "It's alright if it is. I promise I won't judge you." 

"No, I'm not a lesbian, Harry," Hermione smirked, chucking a pillow at him. Her smile fell as she continued. "It's just, erm, I did a spell. And it called forth, well... my true love." 

Harry barked out a short laugh, eyes wide and mirthful. 

"True love? Why Hermione, I never thought you were that soppy. You always seemed so, so utilitarian." At her anxious frown, Harry sobered. "Why are you so nervous, 'Mione? What aren't you telling me?" 

"Well, it's just that... he's a Slytherin," Hermione replied, vaguely terrified Harry would suddenly hate her.

Instead, he adjusted his glasses and whistled lowly. 

"Well, that's a bit odd. I mean, a few of the Slytherins aren't so bad. There are a few in the D.A. that seem trustworthy enough. Is it... is it one of them?" 

"No, and that's the thing. I don't know who he is... exactly. Or when he is. The spell doesn't let us talk, really." Hermione explained the portal, and the way it allowed them their kiss and nothing more. The pain was evident in her voice, and it was clear Harry felt it deeply.

"Well, 'Mione, this is what I think. I truly believe we can't choose who we love. And with all that's going on in the world right now, we need all the love we can get. So, if this mystical Slytherin boy is, well, your true love, then you should go get him. Hold him close when you can, because we..." He choked up, taking his glasses off for a clean as he composed himself. "…We don't know what might happen tomorrow." 

Hermione stood from the wingback chair and hugged Harry, her eyes were misty and her voice thick. 

"Harry, when did you get so smart?" 

He smiled widely, giving her a little shove. "Probably when you were off snogging your boyfriend." 

Harry watched her go, his smile wilting.

"At least one of us is happy," Harry whispered to no one in particular as he rubbed his painful scar. 

 

 

-

 

Harry was right. Time was short these days and she should take what love she had and hold it close. She pulled the curtains of her bed tightly closed and repeated the poem eagerly, but he didn't appear. Her heart, it seemed, was doomed that night. 

With resignation, Hermione changed into her nightgown and slumped into bed. This was horrible. She was so prepared to see him, so sure tonight would be the night but apparently, she was mistaken. She lay there under the red and gold duvet listening to Lavender snore for what felt like hours before she gave up on sleeping. Didn’t that girl know how to use a privacy charm?

"True love..." she repeated it, bitterly this time. Hermione almost shrieked when he did appear, the portal opening up at the far end of her bed. He looked almost as surprised as her, lying as he was on the grass in a field somewhere in his side of the portal. He smiled, a small tick of the lips really, but it was enough to make her heart sing with contentment. His eyes darkened as he raked them over her nightdress, and Hermione had no time to cover up before he rolled onto his side and pulled her against him tightly, the only things between them were layers of cloth and the opalescent sheen of the portal’s event horizon.

 _"Hello, love,"_ she could just barely make out the words he was mouthing. 

 _"Hi, I love you,"_ Hermione whispered back. He watched her lips, then pounced eagerly onto her.

He circumvented her lips and instead kissed the column of her neck. Hermione gasped silently as a little zap of pleasure twisted its way around her throat and down her body. He was electrifying her, loving her back. His body shifted and suddenly he was nearly atop her, hands sliding up her sides, his lips patiently traveling a path from her neck to her lower lip. He wasn't quite kissing her, and it was maddening. Hermione untucked his white collared shirt and slid her hands underneath it, fingers tentatively exploring the sensitive sides of his torso. He seemed crazed then, and finally stopped his questing enough so that Hermione could snog him properly, letting her tongue slide into his mouth.

She felt powerful, even underneath him as she was, but it had been so long since they'd last touched that she needed more. Hermione pulled against his back so he was flush with her and the pressure caused him to groan, his lips leaving hers for just a moment. It was enough, though, and the portal began to close. He rolled away from her frantically back onto the grass, but his fingers were still half tangled in her hair. A curl was wound tightly around one of his digits when the portal shrunk down, and it sliced off silently. Hermione looked at the recently sheared end and huffed, but she was still too pleased to be horrified by it. She had hair enough as it was.

 

-

 

Severus was panting, lying in the dewy grass. It wasn't even six in the morning on a Saturday at Hogwarts and he was... well... indisposed on the field just near the lake. She had been divine in his arms, and when she'd squeezed him to her it had made his pulse race with tension and fire he'd never known before. Breathing deeply, he examined the spring of mahogany and gold hair still clinging to his fingers. It glinted a multitude of colors in the early rising sun and though it wasn't much of anything, it answered one of his questions about her. 

"Brunette." Severus breathed. "I wonder if her eyes are brown as well." The lock of hair was safely deposited into a small vial in his bag for safe keeping, and perhaps experimentation. With potions, he may be able to identify the sample and find her.

 

Hours later, he was studying in the same, grassy spot when a shadow blocked the sun and he knew without a doubt that it was Potter. He stood and looked down his nose at the Gryffindor with a cold, emotionless countenance, and it had the effect Severus expected. It brassed Potter off. Occlumency had served Severus well. 

"I've seen you sniffing around Lily Evans. You need to back the fuck off, Snivellus," Potter threatened, already drawing his wand.

Likewise, Black approached, drew his and pointed it at Severus’ chest, mouth twisting into something strangely ugly on the popular boy’s face.

"Yeah, she wouldn't want you anyway. You're a slimy, disgusting snake,” Black almost ironically hissed out.

"You are aware that Lily is a big girl, and she can make the choice to see whomever she likes." Severus raised an imperious eyebrow. Black sent a stinging hex his way, but he blocked it quickly and efficiently. He scowled at them both, already tired of their games.

"You're just bitter that Lily won't go to Hogsmeade with you, Potter."

James Potter twisted his wand and shouted. 

"You’ll see who’s bitter. Levicorpus!" 

Severus stiffened and began rising by the ankles, he never expected his own spell to be used against him. The only other person to see the book where he wrote his spells down was... was Lily. 

She'd actually betrayed him. Severus should have expected it, but he believed she would always be his friend _first_. 

"Death eater scum!" Black shouted up at him as he dangled. A sizable crowd had gathered to witness his debasing, including Lily and her gaggle of girlfriends. 

"Let him go, James," she demanded sourly, more put out that her favorite looked like the bully he was than anything else. 

Someone in the crowd yelled to look at his dingy pants, and many of them did. He thanked Merlin he was occluding because if he hadn’t, he might cry or scream. Lily glanced up and made a face that was clear in her thinking. 

What a loser. What a _creep_. 

Their friendship died right then. 

He so desperately wanted to yell at her, blame her. An expletive was on the tip of his tongue, but he had occluded to the point where he couldn't feel anything at all, including the desire to exist. 

After a barrage of curses and taunts, he was dropped to his face. Everyone abandoned the scene quickly, afraid a professor might catch them.

Lily remained, though she very clearly didn't want to. 

"Are you alright, Sev?" Lily made no move to help him up, and he didn't ask for it. He stood, brushed the dirt off his robes and the blood off his nose from the fall and looked at his old friend.

"I think it would be best if we didn't associate any longer, Lily," he said icily. "We run in two separate circles, you are clearly embarrassed by me, and I know you told Potter about my spell."

She had the good taste to at least appear ashamed at that, but she quickly snapped back. 

"You're only saying this because you want to join those Death Eaters James always talks about. They hate muggles, Sev, they hate me! And I always thought you were in love with me!" Lily was being petulant and childish. She didn't want to lose a toy she'd always kept at the back of her toy box just in case the better, prettier ones broke. 

"In love with you, Lily?" Severus scoffed with clear indifference. "I valued your friendship, but I haven't been pining away for you like some would have you believe. Far from it, in fact. It seems you, like the other simpletons of this school, are susceptible to gossip."

He narrowed his gaze at her, pinning her with his eyes. 

"Or perhaps you were the source of the rumors. Poor Lily, stalked by the great greasy git. What a tragedy," he bit out sarcastically. 

"No!" Lily insisted violently. "I wouldn't do something like that!" She paused, tears in her eyes, and waited for lord only knew what.

Perhaps she was sniffling and hoping he would apologize, but he wouldn't.

Ultimately, she wiped her tears. "Perhaps you're right, Sev. We can't be friends anymore." Lily almost sounded regretful, and it eased the vice around his heart. 

"We don't need to remain friends for us to remember the time in which we were." His voice was kind when he said it, he meant it. Lily smiled, truly smiled, and patted him on the shoulder. 

"Just don't become a Death Eater, Sev," she chuckled. Severus allowed himself to smirk at that. 

"And don't become Mrs. Potter," he replied warmly. 

 

-

 

Severus knocked back a glass of wine with a grimace. It was cheap, Scottish shite that the Elves kept putting in his liquor cabinet. He complained relentlessly, and yet he kept drinking it. 

In a tipsy haze, he'd dumped that memory into his pensive and dunked his head in, recounting that day. 

It had been the last time he'd spoken to Lily before she died.

Neither of them had kept their promises. 

The other memories were tempting him to immerse himself, especially the next one. It still felt too improper to indulge in. The next ones were flurries of similar encounters, but slowly Hermione Granger would deteriorate. Perhaps the conflict with the Dark Lord would become that consuming. The personal nature of the recollections made him hesitate, but it dawned on him that he could study them and look for clues as to what was to come in the future. Albus was anything but forthcoming, and he was in need of answers.


	6. Part 1

Hermione first noticed it at breakfast. A brief glance at the head table while chewing her toast, quickly scanning her professors for their moods. It was a habit she'd developed early in her Hogwarts career, as it helped prepare her for the day ahead. She rarely needed to look at Professor Snape for his disposition; he was perpetually brusque. Surprisingly, today he was in a good mood, or at least what appeared good for him. It was likely due to the recent news of his appointment as the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. He was mid-sentence, a wicked sort of smirk playing at the man’s lips. It struck Hermione as so... so weirdly familiar, but she couldn't decipher why. She was sure she had never seen the man smile before.

The feeling followed her all that week. Harry was being particularly peculiar. His brewing was improving rapidly because of that Half-Blood Prince book, but he'd also gotten distant and agitated. Their relationship had been strained. 

That niggling feeling she had increased tenfold during Defense one afternoon. Professor Snape had been coldly reading instructions to the students when a Slytherin boy had dared to act up. Unlike with his other students, the Slytherins got off with usually just a minor slap on the wrist. This one, in particular, received an unimpressed arch of the Professors dark eyebrow, one that nearly made Hermione gasp aloud. Her Slytherin looked rather like... or her Professor resembled... no, the idea of it was too strange. 

But the thought had stuck and began sprouting roots within her mind. 

Was her Slytherin related to the Professor somehow?  Surely there were more than just a singular Snape around. Hermione dropped a scroll in the library as a terrifying thought bombarded her. Please, Morgana, let it not be Severus Snape's father that she was somehow trans-dimensionally snogging. That would be too mortifying!

Hermione set to the task of researching the Snape family name. As a pureblood, there must be some information about the Professor. 

There was nothing. Not a single jot. A few rather interesting articles about the man himself, but nothing about his relations or anything. Perhaps he wasn't pure-blooded, but she'd always just assumed. It was rather disheartening, she'd hoped to find a clue as to who her man was. 

The Slug Club Christmas party wasn't too far off though, and it was possible she could persuade the always garrulous Horace Slughorn to divulge some information on the Snapes. The old man seemed to know everyone. 

 

-

 

The party was gaudy and smoky and, though Hermione was on a specific mission, she had still allowed Ron to accompany her. She didn't want him to feel left out or anything, but now he was beginning to wear her patience thin. She needed to speak to Professor Slughorn. 

"So, then he said..." Ron chatted, shoving a hand pie into his mouth. 

"Ron, I need to speak to Professor Slughorn about our assignment for the new year. Look, over there, isn't that Lavender Brown? She liked you, didn't she?" Hermione was practically shoving the still chewing redhead over.

"But 'Mione, I thought you, uhh..." His thought was left unfinished because at that moment Ron finally understood. No, she didn't like him that way, and he was free to feel as he wished, about anyone he wished.

"Thanks, 'Mione." And with that, it felt like a fog was lifted from their relationship. Ron went his merry way over to Lavender and began chatting her into a corner, and Hermione left feeling lighter. Finally, they could put that mess behind them. Finally, they could be friends again.

Hermione managed to grab Slughorn’s attention not too long after, and the man was as eager to chat as she'd anticipated. 

"Was Professor Snape in the Slug Club, Professor Slughorn? I always imagined so, considering he must have been a top student of yours." Her leading question set the man directly on the path she'd hoped. 

"Oh yes, yes he was. And so was dear Lily Evans, nee Potter, of course. They were friendly back then you know, Severus and Lily Evans. He was the top of the class, to be sure, but she was such a bright and lovely young lady. Here, look, that photo over there was of us all just before Severus stopped attending." 

The portly man escorted her across the room to a smaller hallway, pointing out first to the only ginger in the photo. 

"There is Lily, quite a beauty. They say Harry has her eyes, and I would agree." 

Hermione nodded politely, though internally she groaned. Was that the only commonality between the late mother and her son that anyone could comment on?

"And there, in the corner, is Severus. But Evans was such a wonderful girl, very charming and adept at conversation. She once told a story about..." 

But Hermione wasn't listening. Just there in the corner of the room of the magical photo was a man she _knew_. His height was familiar, and his hair was perpetually falling into his face. He tossed some of it away from his dark eyes and then tugged at the green scarf wrapped about his neck. And there, there was the proof Hermione didn't realize she was looking for. Proof that her Slytherin was real and somewhere out in the world. The tassels that dangled from its ends were missing in just the right spot. Tassels that she still kept in her notebook like a safely guarded treasure.

But he was too tangible, and too close. 

"Ah, look, there is Severus now. Perhaps you can go ask him yourself if he's in a receptive mood," Slughorn chuckled, directing her attention to the door. 

Professor Snape indeed stood by the door, scowling down at Draco Malfoy for a reason she couldn't fathom. With the barest squint, she could picture it, there in his place. 

Slytherin uniform, uncut hair, youthful face. It was him. He was... right there.

Hermione felt like she was dreaming but she couldn't force herself to wake up. The delirium made her ever so slightly nauseous. Professor Snape scowled something darkly to Malfoy and she almost giggled in madness. She had kissed those lips! Lips that had sneered at her over her cauldron for years. 

Tasted the sharp tongue that lashed out insults she still, to this day, couldn't stop from echoing in her mind.

She... she loved that man? 

With Malfoy gripped tightly in one pale hand, Professor Snape swept from the party in his characteristic dramatic fashion. Her heart fluttered, horrifyingly, and she found that the knowledge of who he really was would not settle properly. Her brain was naturally skeptical of the unbelievable.

In her bed that night, Hermione's clearly addled mind whirred over the possibilities. Was her Professor just pretending that he'd not, at one point in his life, snogged his student? Or maybe he didn't remember, maybe the encounters mattered that little to him. Hermione slapped her hands over her face in shame. Or maybe the poor man had Obliviated the memories from his brain the moment he knew it was her. She wouldn't doubt it, she was sure Professor Snape loathed her. 

Or maybe it was a different Severus Snape altogether? From another... dimension? Was that even possible?

With a weary groan, Hermione rolled over in her bed and sunk deep under the duvet. She wanted to see Severus. _Her_ Severus, and she wanted to kiss him. And how absolutely mental was that? Hermione tried picturing herself pressing her lips to his, the Professor's lips, and it sent a strange thrill through her. He was so tall and imposing, she could imagine his voluminous robes swallowing her up as they embraced. Would he kiss her sweetly as his other self did? Or would he... would he ravage her?

With a shake of her head, Hermione dispersed the image before she could let it play out. It wasn't right, it didn't feel right to think about Professor Snape that way. 

A week or so later, it had only gotten worse. Defense was a nightmare, her wand movements faltered, and casting was a struggle. Every biting criticism from her Professor sent a blush down her neck, for all Hermione could think of in her head was what he'd... or another Severus... had done with her the years prior. She was still thinking of him in the library as she, again, was trying to research the spell that brought his younger self to her side. With no luck, she slumped against one of the cold windows.

The library was even quieter than usual. Almost everyone had already left on holiday and she was due to depart later to meet her parents. Madam Pince had been in the process of closing the library earlier when Hermione had begged to be admitted. Reluctantly the woman allowed her entrance and had left the books in the capable hands of the school’s famous swot. It was a dream come true for Hermione, and yet she couldn't stop thinking about him. If she called him, right now, would he look as he did in that photo Professor Slughorn had eagerly shown her? Or would he look more like the older, more frightening version of himself? The prospect of finding out was too tempting.

Hermione repeated the spell once more.

 

-

 

Severus had been in the library reading in solitude. The holiday was nearly upon Hogwarts, and it was his favorite time of year simply because no one else had shitty enough home lives to stick around the castle. Not like him. Eileen had written, the muggle way, and had begged him to return home. Tobias was in prison, she'd said, and wouldn't be out for a long while. 

It mattered little to Severus. While he'd stayed away because of Tobias's beatings, he couldn't go back and visit the women who'd stood by and let him get beaten.

That year he'd spent a lot of time in this library, sitting in the back corner, thinking about his witch. He had time to spare for daydreams, as he was fairly isolated. Lily took well to the not-being-friends thing, and she acted as if they'd never even known one another. That suited him just fine, and it meant the Marauders did too since James no longer considered Severus a threat. Lily still strung that bastard along like a pony on a lead but, well, it wasn't Severus's business to care any longer. Instead, he focused twofold on his studies and it had finally paid off. During a Slug Club party, Slughorn had introduced him to a well-respected Potion Master by the name of Emar Aberghast, who admitted he was looking to take on an apprentice in the coming years. Slughorn had sung his praises, and it seemed Severus may actually have something to do right after graduation. 

There was only one minor issue. Aberghast was a Death Eater. 

Severus couldn't be sure what that meant for his future, but he couldn't pass the opportunity up. He had to become a master, and with no money to lure a good master to take him on, this was the only feasible way. The ideology was odious but if Regulus had found a home with the group, maybe it wouldn’t be _so_ bad.

Also on his mind had been what he'd do the next time he managed to catch his spectral girl. Endless nights were spent ruminating on the intricacies of the weird spell, of what it seemed to consider a kiss. Direct contact of their lips triggered the spells conclusion, so perhaps if he avoided hers for a time, he could try some... other things he'd read about. It would have made him blush to consider, had he not been Occluding. 

He'd been trying the spell nearly every night in the dorm, but she hadn't come to him. Severus looked around the empty library and thought that perhaps here would be fine as well. He cast Muffliato around himself and then began murmuring the spell, lest a professor walk by and hear the childish words coming from his lips. Between the stacks, the blue light poured out of a crack in reality, and Severus felt that familiar spark of exhilaration every time it worked. There she was, so beautiful and lovely leaning against the same window he faced between the shelves. Severus closed the distance, caging her with his arms against the glass. He had her now, and he wasn't going to let her go. 


	7. Chapter 6: Part 2

Hermione lost her breath when he appeared, just as imposing as the Professor she'd seen just that morning in the halls. This Severus, however, smiled down at her so tenderly it made her heart beat rapidly against her chest. Severus advanced on her and covered her body with his, the blue glow of the portal casting strange shadows over the books to either side. Hermione threaded her fingers through his hair and began to pull him to her for her long desired kiss, but he wouldn't let her. With a sly, almost wicked looking smile he shook head no, then he began what Hermione could only describe as utterly sweet torture.

 

Severus nuzzled her just below her ear, tongue darting out to taste her skin. He laved at her pulse, smirking up at Hermione as his gaze began to darken. His descent continued as she fidgeted. Off came her jumper, and with a gasp from her parted lips he divested her of the white button up and tie she wore every day. Her back again pressed against the cold window, but now it was almost unbearably icy. He was laughing at her, Hermione thought dazedly, as he planted light kisses all along her rib cage and stomach. His wicked hands were rolling up her wool skirt and she could do nothing but stare down, eyes half-lidded and paralyzed by lust. She knew who he was, what he might become, but she couldn't care. Not now while he was caressing her through her knickers, teasingly slow.

 

A pool of heat was building in her lower belly as he worshipped her, heat that built and built until it felt like the walls of the castle would crumble down about them and the cool glass at her back would shatter. She was shattering, and Severus was proudly looking on as it happened.

 

Hermione didn't let him stay on his knees for long. They were so close the blue of the portal was actually beginning to burn her eyes, but she couldn't stop. She pulled him up to her and tore his Slytherin tie off, tossing it to the ground. An impatient hand went under his shirt and jumper, the other sliding down into his back pocket demandingly. Hermione had never felt like this before, so consumed and needy. Severus was pressing himself against her, still attempting to avoid her lips for fear he would collapse their window of opportunity. In her orgasmic haze, Hermione had no such forethought. She kissed his nose, then his chin, then finally she could no longer ignore his lips.

 

"Severus, oh Severus..." Hermione whispered against them, and he almost thought he could hear it. Their lips finally met and then it was over practically before they could realize. Hermione was left breathless against the cold window of the library, shirtless and on the verge of tears.

 

She collected her clothes with barely contained sniffles. On the floor by her discarded jumper was his tie, now gleaming silver and green in the warm light of the library. Hermione picked it up reverently, running her fingers over the silky material. On the back side she found the label, with the name S. Snape handwritten on it. A laugh burbled out from her unexpectedly as she read it, the undeniable evidence that she indeed loved Severus Snape. 

 

-

 

Severus couldn't believe his younger self, the confidence he'd had to try something so bold was alien to him now. Where had it all vanished? It was a rhetorical question, for Severus knew. It had disappeared when she had. And instead of the man he could have been, bold and passionate, he was a horrid and mistrustful bastard, one who killed and tortured with indifference for two different masters. One who felt nothing and could never move on.

 

Now he spun uncontrollably towards his inevitable death, hoping only that it would end quickly rather than after extended torture. Severus slumped back into his worn out leather chair with a weary sigh. Why had he given in? Why had he watched that memory? He supposed it was just simple wistfulness, it was around this time of year that it had happened. Or maybe it was so he would no longer see her tortured face in his nightmares. Where Hermione had been all breathless smiles during this memory, in the last moments they shared she had been crazed and fragile. He didn't want to remember her that way, if he was forced to remember her at all.

 

Severus closed his eyes and reluctantly allowed himself to think back on it. He'd placed all the memories back in his head, but it was already managing to make him feel insane. The firelight danced through his eyelids and backlit her striking image. Skinny, dirty and weeping. She'd been so angry, and he'd been so afraid, so bewildered by her appearance. And then she'd brought him into her tent, forced him down...

 

He had lost his virginity that night. Severus couldn't think of pleasure now without feeling utterly bereaved.

 

He wanted to Obliviate himself, to take the memory from his mind and throw it into the sea. He could still see the locket she wore, dangling above his pale and terrified face as she... as...

 

Severus shot up from his seat, knocking a glass of wine and a book to the floor with a crash. That locket! He knew it, knew what it was. How in Merlin's name had it ended up around her neck? 

Severus sprinted to his office, then to the room where he kept his cupboard of memories. There they all were, dated and gleaming darkly in the unlit room, tempting him to rediscover them. Severus went through them all until he found the one, dated December 2nd, 1979. He quickly uncorked the bottle and sent the sliver of memory into the watery surface of his Pensieve then dove after it. 

 

The darkness of his rooms was replaced by a sinister red glow. He was standing in a place he hadn't been to for years, a wizarding club in London that housed the original Death Eaters and their ilk. Seductive eastern music filled the room, and there a few feet away sat himself and a few others of their kind. They smoked hookah and drank heavily of absinthe, discussing the recent speech given by the Dark Lord.

It had been such a different time. The Death Eaters hadn't become what they were now, and it shocked him to recall. They'd just come from a revel, rather tame in comparison to the cultic bloodbaths they were now. That particular night the Dark Lord had shared his ideology with them, primed them for removing what he called 'muggle influence' from their world, then sent them into a psychedelic trance of his own design. The high was indescribable, and they were quickly addicted to the promises he made.

 

Severus walked closer to his younger self and listened with disgust as he spoke lowly to Regulus Black. They had become confidants in those years, though never really breached the threshold of friendship. The other men at their table dispersed, and, when they were alone, Regulus had enthusiastically shown him something.

 

"Look, Snape." The wavy-haired man pulled a beautifully crafted locket from his robes, the emblem of Salazar Slytherin delicately carved into the face that glinted in the lantern light.

 

"The Dark Lord has asked me for it,” he divulged excitedly.  “Says it's horribly important for his research."

 

Severus examined the locket curiously, though restrained his reaction well. It was incredible! An artifact from the founders.

 

"What research, Regulus?" Severus couldn't help himself, he desperately wished to know everything about it. 

Regulus shook his head and placed it back within his robes.

 

"I'm not absolutely certain, to be honest. Something regarding the soul and bindings? But the Dark Lord has promised I will be highly rewarded for presenting it to him, loathe as I am to give it up."

 

The memory seemed to freeze around Severus as, like a bludger, realization hit quickly and without mercy. That locket had passed from Regulus to the Dark Lord, and then Regulus had gone missing. Presumed dead, a traitor some had said. Whatever the Dark Lord had done with that locket had made a devout follower like Regulus turn tail and flee.

Pieces were falling into place faster than Severus could cope with. The way Albus had resigned his life, giving in to temptation with that ring. The methodical way he'd set up the Potter boy for his destiny. The ring, the diary, the boy’s blasted scar that inexplicably connected him to the Dark Lord.

 

And that _locket_.

 

There were Horcruxes, Merlin only knew how many, and they were the silent strength behind the Dark Lord. And that boy, Lily's boy, would die.


	8. Chapter 7: Part 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A word of warning, there is what some may consider very mild dubcon in this chapter, but I assure you that while it is emotional, it is consensual. 
> 
> A bit of a time jump for this one.

The ballroom of Malfoy Manor was nothing of its former splendor. Severus sat among the loyal and most trusted of the Death Eaters, his silver mask in hand. The trusted had no need to conceal themselves, the Dark Lord told them. He wanted to see every inch of their faces. Tonight, they would report to their Lord, tell him the news he desired to hear. Bellatrix was simpering and stroking the Dark Lord's translucent pale forearms, desperately expressing her ardor for his cause. The sight sickened Severus, but it was exactly where he'd hope that crazy woman would be.

It had been so easy to plant the memory in her mind where she least expected to be tampered with. She believed herself a capable Occlumens and were that true she would not be so prime to accept false information. He'd also seen her Occlumency walls, thick barbed wire wrapping around the memories of her Gringotts vault. It nearly made Severus laugh, how easy it was to suss out exactly where she wanted no one to peer.

 

"My lord, the muggle family begged when we killed their mudblood child. It was too good!" Bellatrix was saying, eyes sparkling with lust. She was wanting a reward that night, it was clear to all within the ballroom. Voldemort reached a pale hand out as if to caress her, then directed his movement to his side. Beside the Dark Lord slithered his pet snake, who nuzzled its large head under his grasp. Bellatrix's eyes flamed with agitation, but she continued her report. No, they had not found the Boy Who Lived nor his mudblood friend yet, and Severus thanked the Gods for that.

Severus was looking at the snake by the Dark Lord as it happened, the abomination's eerie bulbous eyes had begun to fog over and look pale. A gurgle came forth from its maw, and black blood poured from it to the white marble floor.

 

"Nagini?" Voldemort threw Bellatrix off him and rounded on his pet, checking it with diagnostic spells frantically.

 

"She's been poisoned!" He cried, and then its scaly body slumped into the puddle of its own bile and blood dead. Some eyes turned to Severus, he _was_ a potions master, but Lucius Malfoy stepped up to speak before anyone could utter a word of accusation.

"My lord, I witnessed my sister in law feeding your pet this morning, a head from one of my many peacocks that roam the grounds," Lucius said, and he was not lying. Bellatrix had truly done so, as she often did for a bit of fun. “I would hazard a guess that she is responsible.”

 

The Dark Lord grabbed Bellatrix off the ground brutally and entered deeply into her fraying mind. The woman screamed as he rifled through her memories, and it was apparent when he found the one Severus wished he would.

A jealous and mad Bellatrix poisoning the snake. She wanted the Dark Lord to keep his eyes on _her_. She was desperate for him, desperate enough to kill his beloved pet.

 

The Dark Lord had killed Bellatrix that evening, before her stunned husband and sobbing sister. No Cruciatus was cast as the crazed woman had been known to enjoy the pain. A simple but satisfying flick of the wrist and an Avada had sent the woman to her end.

Then Severus had been entrusted with the Cup. Clearly, he was more up to the task of guarding it.

 

Severus allowed himself to smile darkly down at the cold and malevolent object once he was within his office at Hogwarts.

"What have you done, Severus? This trial was for Harry to complete!" Albus seethed from within his gilded frame. Severus brushed back his dark hair, not even bothering to cast his eyes up to his once master.

"You were a fool, old man. This is not a task for children."

 

-

 

 

Severus hid behind a tree, clutching the Sword of Gryffindor tightly in his grasp as he listened to Hermione Granger's pained weeping. The forest clearing they had made camp in was filled with that blue light, casting weird shadows between the barren branches of the trees and along the icy surface of the snow.

 

Why had he come here _now_? He could have waited until it was over with. His hearing tuned sharply to her voice as she began shouting, but this time the strange muting of her voice was not present to stop him from understanding her.

 

"Severus Snape, how could you? You betrayed us!" His eyes widened as Hermione screamed his name, his limbs all feeling numb and bizarrely heavy. So, she knew, but for how long? How long had she known it was he whom she'd given herself to? He could hear the pain in her raw voice, hear the smacking of her hands against his stunned, younger self's chest. 

 

"Why? Why Severus why? Please..." she begged tearfully, and he recalled how desperately she'd clung to his apprentice robes. How frantically she ripped his sleeve up to expose his sin.

 

"No, no, Severus you didn't..."

Hearing her sob his voice so desperately was tearing away at him. A part of him wanted so badly to rush through the clearing and grab onto her, cling to her and promise he would do better, beg for her sweet forgiveness. But Severus knew the score. He had to let it play out as he remembered, as painful as that was.

 

"Please tell me it was all some plan, all some trick, and I'll forgive you. Please, Severus!" Her words were muffled, face buried in the crook of young Severus' neck as she cried.

 

 _What's wrong?_ , he remembered trying to ask her, shout to her through the portal. As if a switch was flipped, Hermione desperately began to grab him, ripping at his clothes. A distant voice could be heard, darkly goading her with lies and threats.

 

 _"He's a murderer, he would take delight in slitting your mudblood throat for me,"_ it whispered nastily. The voice was one Severus knew well, and it sent a chill of terror down his spine. The Dark Lord was there, inside the locket she carried.

 

"No, no you're wrong!" Hermione cried vehemently. "I know, I know he cannot be a bad man!"

 

_"Oh yes he is, he has killed so many muggle women. He killed Harry's mother when she wouldn't be with him, isn't that so pathetic? And you think he could find love for a dirty blooded whore like you? You’re going to fail, girl, fail and doom Harry because you can’t keep your legs together and lips shut. He wouldn’t take you anyway, wouldn’t sully his prick with you."_

 

"No, please Severus, make it stop..." Hermione was dragging his younger self within the tent frantically. His horror-stricken expression was evident even from across the clearing.

 

Severus screwed his eyes closed and remembered with obscene clarity what was to occur. Pure rage was beginning to consume him, as now he finally knew the whole story of that evening. Where once he was petrified and confused, now he was murderous. That creature was in that locket, torturing Hermione and twisting up her mind.

 

The Headmaster had begged him to plant the sword for Harry to find and send a doe to guide him. It would not be so.

Severus was done playing games.

 

 

-

 

 

Hermione barely remembered uttering the spell to summon Severus. It felt like the world was blurring around her, like a nightmare. The locket had said so many terrible things to her as she tore at Severus, as she practically forced him to make love to her silently in the tent she shared with Harry.

The Dark Mark gleamed on his forearm, and yet he looked so frightened by her. So innocent and confused by her anger.

Hermione had held his face between her hands and quietly begged him to understand, to realize her grief and rage wasn't meant for him, but of course he couldn't. She kissed his cheeks, whispering apologies and affirmations against his skin. Severus seemed to gather then that whatever had been plaguing her had passed, and he returned the embrace fully. He buried his nose into the wild and tangled mane of her hair and breathed heavily, the weight of the experience crushing him.

She kept him there so long that the blue horizon of the portal actually began to _burn_ them.

They were panting from the singe of pain by the end, and the kiss they finally shared was nothing like the ones before. Where those were in love or in passion, this one was a resigned finale to their shared suffering.

 

She was asleep by the time Severus Snape entered the tent noiselessly. He bent over her fitfully resting form, black robes curtaining around her cot.

 

Delicately, as not to wake her, Severus slid the hissing locket from around her neck. Held aloft before his thunderous, black eyes it screamed obscenities and seethed hateful dishonesty. With a sneer, he held it tightly in a fist, then bent back over the sleeping girl.

 

"It will be different, from now on," he promised quietly. With ever mounting regret, Severus spun from the room and took the locket with him. It would plague his girl no more.

 

 

 

In the morning Hermione woke with a splitting headache and bloodshot eyes. Harry was calling her name anxiously from the other room, so she bolted from bed as quickly as her wobbly legs could take her.

 

Harry was standing in his pajamas looking baffled, pointing to the low table where they usually ate their simple meals together.

The locket was open face up on the table and embedded through it, deep set into the wood of the table, was the Sword of Gryffindor. Sitting beside the carnage was the Tales of Beedle and Bard book, a note resting atop it.

 

 

_"Hufflepuff Cup - blue rubbish bin on the corner of Arrow St and Third, Lavernock_

 

_Ravenclaw Diadem - unknown, perhaps still at Hogwarts_

 

_Nagini - dispatched_

 

_I shall explain it all when the time is right. This war has nearly ended."_


	9. Chapter 7: Part 2

"Hermione, it's Dumbledore, I know it!" Harry said manically. He hadn't slept much these past few months, none of them had. 

Except for Ron, of course.

He'd stumbled back to their tent that morning with a sloppy apology and a full belly of his mother’s cooking. Hermione wanted to resent him, but would she have run back to her parents if they were there to escape to? Perhaps. Every second spent with the locket present made her desperate to run.

 

"I don't see how, Harry. Even if he'd set this up before his... passing, how could he have known where we would be? If he knew the locations of the other Horcruxes, why hadn't he simply destroyed them instead of sending us out to hunt them?" 

Ron huffed, he'd likely stopped listening halfway through her argument.

 

"I don't know, but I agree with Harry. If you don't think it's Dumbledore, then who do you suggest came through your wards and protections to kill the blasted thing?" It was a challenge; the kind Hermione had grown to loathe from the boys. She would express concern, and when she couldn't prove the validity of her fear, they would go their merry way ignoring her advice. 

The worst part was that she knew. She bloody _knew_ who it was, but could she really say? The moment 'Severus Snape' left her lips she would be bound and interrogated, they would assume she'd gone ‘round it.

 

"I'm... I'm not sure, Ron," she lied. With self-satisfied smiles, the boys went back to their planning and making up. It seemed Harry didn't really blame Ron for abandoning them, either. As they schemed excitedly, Hermione's mind was working painfully fast. 

The timing was too perfect to be a coincidence. He must have remembered last night. He must remember her, too, then. 

And if Severus was killing and collecting Horcruxes, then that meant he was seemingly still on their side. But then why... why kill the Headmaster? What was happening behind the scenes that the Headmaster hadn't seen fit to tell them? 

Her thoughts were in tatters by the time they packed everything up. The three of them had all agreed to Apparate to Lavernock and collect the Hufflepuff Cup, then they would try and find a way inside Hogwarts. The boys kept discussing the dangers of entering a 'Death Eater controlled school', but she assured them it would work out. Severus was there, and she was sure he would protect them.

 

-

 

Everything was ready and the war practically at the gates. Hermione and two boys were in the school at that very minute, rifling through the Come and Go room for the Diadem. When they finished and came for him, he would already be gone, the only thing left for them to find would be his last message. Severus delighted in leading the Dark Lord to Hogwarts that day, knowing full well he would meet his end.

And so would he, no doubt. Severus was on his way to the shack to meet with his master for what he believed would be the last time. Either he would die, or Voldemort would in the end, and that was all that mattered to him.

 

The Elder Wand had been a surprise. The Dark Lord thanked him for his years of faithful service, explaining how his death would seal the fate of his lord's victory. It was almost a joke really, knowing he would die in this dilapidated house after all.

 

"What was that spell you created for your initiation again, Severus?” Voldemort inquired with a sinister smile and twirled his new wand with glee. “Oh yes, Sectumsempra !"

Voldemort slashed wound after wound upon his skin, letting his blood soak through the splintering floorboards.

Severus was on his knees then, counting the seconds and begging for it to end. He knew it was the end, but he so wished he could have seen Hermione one last time. His old habit came back, repeating that little poem lowly as he fervently wished he could be anywhere else. As Severus felt the life drain from him, he thought he could almost see the blue light of her arrival, and it beckoned him to his final sleep.

 

-

 

They had gone to Hogwarts, and everything had spiraled from there. Death Eaters had been notified and were on their way to the castle, and the students were being hidden all over by the staff. Everyone was in grave danger.

 

The Headmaster's office had been empty when they arrived, mangled diadem and all. A Pensieve sat on the desk, water swirling ominously as it awaited their exploration. Two vials, neatly labeled were next to it. One said, 'for Harry' and the other 'for Hermione'. Harry dumped his vial’s contents into the Pensieve and dove after them, but Ron was curiously looking at her.

 

"Why would Professor Dumbledore leave memories for you, Hermione?"

Tears came unbidden to her eyes and she fell to the soft carpeted floor.

He was saying goodbye. Severus expected he would die, so he left her his memories. She would never get to see him again, never get to know the good man she knew he was.

Ron tried to comfort her, confused as he was, and then Harry reemerged from the Pensieve, looking very much older and grim.

 

"Harry? What's wrong? 'Mione won't stop crying," Ron said from his position over his shaking friend.

And then her heart broke twice as Harry explained what he was. What had to happen.

 

 

After the battle, Hermione tried to look for him. Many searched for their dead, urgently so they could mourn and bury them. Molly, poor Molly had to inter her son and Ron his brother.

Everyone had someone to grieve for, but only Harry knew that hers was Severus.

The Aurors found copious amounts of his blood all over the Shrieking Shack, but no body was there to recover. The faint glimmer of hope at that was dashed when she was told just how _much_ blood had been discovered. She and Harry recounted his heroism, cleared his name, but it mattered little. Severus Snape was dead. Her Slytherin was gone.

 

Legal exoneration and death certificates had taken time, and _so_ many others needed to be buried first. It was a year before they could officially bury him, and they’d chosen to remember him on the anniversary of the Final Battle. The tomb would house nothing but his memory and a wooden box, but Hermione had insisted they honor him. He would have his day, Hermione made sure of that.

She sat in the front row of the mourners, next to his frail and severe looking mother Eileen. They had come to know and grow close to one another in the wake of his death. The old woman was the only piece of him Hermione had left.

 

If anyone was bewildered by the brains of the Golden Trio sitting where a widow might during his eulogies, no one commented. Her mournful black dress was covered by his voluminous teaching cloak, the layers protecting her from onlooker’s curiosity and derision.

As an empty casket was lowered into the Scottish soil, Hermione murmured the sweet little incantation one last time. One last bitter call to him.

 

“True love, true love, do you truly miss me? True love, true love, won't you come and kiss me."

 

And then pandemonium broke out. Guests and mourners were shouting in confusion and fear, Harry was on his feet with his wand drawn, pointing at a blue tear in reality cut straight through the Hogwarts graveyard.

On the other side of the warbling event horizon, she could see Severus being cut down, Voldemort's retreating back as he exited the Shrieking Shack. Hermione jumped into action, scrambling over wreaths of flowers and clumps of soil.

 

"Severus!" Hermione pierced her hands through the veil and into the shack, gripping his soiled robes with frenzied determination. He was a dead weight as she pulled, and she began to scream in pain as the portal burned through her dress and skin in protest, cutting down to the bone.

This was not how it was supposed to be, not how the spell was intended to work!

 

Harry was at her back, dragging her through to their time. He let them go as momentum picked up, and Hermione flew through the precipice with Severus. He landed on his back with a painful thud, and Hermione was thrown atop him. The black robes of his that she wore fell around them like a shroud, sealing them together and shielding them.

 

 

Severus' eyes blinked open as a new pain lanced through him, a rib had cracked in the fall. When his gaze focused as much as it could, he was struck in awe.

His girl was there above him like a seraph, bathed in blue light. Distantly, people were beginning to shriek, confusion was spreading quickly as the spectacle unfolded. Someone was shouting that a corpse had fallen from the veil.

 

"H... Hermione, kiss me and close that... blasted thing," his rough baritone demanded weakly. With a choked sob, Hermione sealed her lips to his and kissed him, her grief transmuting into joy. A year since that day and here he was, right here in her arms!

 

Harry rushed to them and chanted the counter curse, stopping the Professor's bleeding before he could die in the grass. Hermione was still gripped onto the man like her life depended on it, nuzzling his cheek with hers as she beamed tearily.

 

"You’re here, you’re here and not dead!" Hermione was saying between kisses, lips rarely parting from his. Severus took a long, dazed look around him, at the coffin hovering in midair behind them and the droves of fearful black-dressed onlookers and sighed.

 

“Very perceptive, love,” he replied with an irreverent smirk. 

 

The day of his burial Severus Snape was pronounced alive. The papers reported it was a freak accident of nature, the way he had been deposited over his own grave, and no one knew quite what to think about it.

Hermione proudly presented Severus with his Order of Merlin, first class for his heroism, and delighted in his shock as he was thanked heartily by Harry Potter.

 

And finally, the path between them had been traveled to its conclusion.

 

Or, perhaps, its beginning…

 

-

 

He was rousing from dreams of times long past. Severus could feel warm lips peppering kisses upon his face as a blue light diffused around him, and at first, it seemed like he hadn't woken up at all. He cracked an eye open to make sure he wasn't still dreaming and was rewarded for his curiosity by a face full of wild, chestnut curls. The blue was coming not from the precipice of a magical portal, but from a pair of robin’s-egg-colored curtains that hung over the window in their bedroom.

 

"Why have you woken me up, you feral woman?" he groused playfully. Hermione sat up, perched atop his lap and left a dainty peck on the end of his nose.

 

"True love, true love..." she snickered lowly, earning herself a tickle to her side. Severus rolled over and pinned her beneath him, letting a chuckle escape him before he could contain himself.

 

"Cease your silliness, Hermione."

She giggled at that, then wrapped her arms around him tightly.

 

"Won't you come and kiss me, Severus?" Hermione asked breathlessly, and he did. He stole a kiss from her for every second they’d spent apart, and they didn't leave their bed until it was much later into the afternoon than they’d intended to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is it. Thanks so much for everyone's love and feedback. It's given me a lot of motivation to continue writing. If people are interested, there may be a sequel and some other additional stuff... Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed reading this story as much as I enjoyed writing it.


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